


from distant star to this here bar

by wrennette



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: au-ish, other characters mentioned by not present, the world post off-screen and unspecified apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-18
Updated: 2017-11-18
Packaged: 2019-02-03 23:44:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12758703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wrennette/pseuds/wrennette
Summary: Darcy and Jane found a door, and Darcy hasn't stopped walking since.





	from distant star to this here bar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Yatzuaka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yatzuaka/gifts).
  * Inspired by [been to the moon and the stars and the go inbetweens](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12163446) by [Yatzuaka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yatzuaka/pseuds/Yatzuaka). 



> title from Allison by the Pixies. 
> 
> I read Yatzuaka's [been to the moon and the stars and the go inbetweens](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12163446) and got full of questions. and then decided to try and answer some of them. there was supposed to be a lot more existential dread in this, but Darcy didn't feel like cooperating.

There is a hole in the world. Jane has a scientific name for it, formulas and equations that even after her years of stuffing her brain with calculus that _definitely_ wasn’t covered in a humanities degree like Poli Sci, Darcy can’t quite make herself like or fully understand. What matters is there is a yawning space, more obvious even than those opened by the Convergence. Jane of course wants to go through. Darcy, knowing that there will be no stopping her friend and boss, ensures they can go through safely.

When they finally step through, each of them is carrying an overstuffed backpack full of supplies. Jane’s champing at the bit, taking readings the whole time. Darcy looks back at the nylon clothesline stretching behind them, tied to a nearby dumpster. Her tazer is fully charged, and this close to the - entrance? - portal? - she even has cell reception. That doesn’t stop Darcy from anticipating the worst. 

Last time they’d travelled to other worlds, Jane had ended up as host to a cosmic entity that did - frankly Darcy wasn’t quite sure what had happened, just that Jane had come back from Asgard furious and sad, and had actually been downright cautious for about three seconds before sticking her hand into a half-assembled machine that promptly shocked her so badly her fingers blistered. Thor - Thor hadn’t come back to see them since, and from what Darcy pieced together from Jane’s disjointed rambling, it sounded like their relationship had ended - and badly.

That - that had been months and worlds ago. That was - before. Before. 

They had found their way back from that particular journey. Not wholly changed, but eyes opened to the wonders - and dangers - of the intertwining cosmos. Finding those thin places, places where a slight tug or gentle _pull_ might open a path - elsewhere - had become almost childsplay. Jane would do calculations - Darcy - Darcy simply had a knack. An instinct for places she probably wasn’t supposed to be. They’d been exploring for some time before they realized it was changing them. It was changing _everything_. 

Had they opened the wrong door? Darcy would wonder, the question gnawing at her brain in the dark times when she couldn’t sleep. Had they awaken the proverbial dragon? It was not sudden. There was a slow shift. Shadows Darcy had tried not to notice in their travels eventually followed them home. It was so gradual they didn’t even notice at first. Like frogs in a boiling pot. Well - almost. Darcy had managed to wake up enough to realize and jump - and to drag Jane with her - before they were utterly cooked.

Much of their equipment had been left behind when they left home for the last time. _There be monsters_ whispered in Darcy’s ears. But apps - apps could do a lot. Her phone could sample the air and read the temperature and do a whole hell of a lot once she’d broken the operating system a few times and had it answering to her rather than the other way around. 

The shadows lingered.

At first Darcy thought she was hallucinating. But the ways they travelled were open to all, and there were - native populations as well. It was a good thing, in truth, otherwise they would have starved within weeks. But the shadows that danced at the edges of Darcy’s vision weren’t comforting. She learned to taze first and ask questions later, not too different from navigating any major city after dark. 

They’d found Helen and Betty in - that place-with-the-yellow-sky, Darcy thought. They’d been doing pretty well for themselves; still were, the last time Darcy had passed though. She didn’t go back often though, too worried she would lead something to their safe haven. They appreciated the consideration, although Jane - Jane always asked Darcy to stay longer, to settle there with them. 

It could be a home, Darcy knew, if she let it. But it wasn’t _her_ home, no matter that Jane’s presence nearly made it so. So Darcy wandered now, and Jane was her fixed point, her pole star. Maybe she would circle back around to the place-with-the-yellow-sky soon. She was getting low on rations. But the tall shadow - she’d have to do something about _that_ first. 

She named the shadows to de-fang them. There was the tentacle shadow in the purple-sky-and-stars-place, which was - actually a pretty nice creature, once you got past the - you know - tentacles. There were the creeping shadows in the dim-red-place. Darcy never stopped in the dim-red-place, never rested, kept strictly to the path and her eyes turned forward, tazer clutched tight against her chest, scarf wrapped tight about her head. _If I can’t see it, it can’t see me_ she childishly thought, and put one foot in front of the other. 

_The only way out is through_.

In the just-as-dim-blue-place there were many shadows, large and still, the ice creaking like something out of a nature special on global warming. Or maybe penguins. It was nicer to think about penguins frankly, and so she imagined the shadows in the just-as-dim-blue-place belonged to penguins the size of skyscrapers, huddling under their feathers against the daunting chill.

The worst were the following shadows, that lingered from place to place. It was these Darcy truly feared. The tentacle shadow was more or less sedentary, and could not follow. The penguin shadows did not follow, and so it did not matter that they were not sedentary. The creeping shadows - for a while she had feared they had followed into the dim paths between places that weren’t places. But there was a malevolence to the creeping shadows of the dim-red-place that was not the same as that of the following shadows. 

The following shadows, she learned after she tazed one of them, were people. Perhaps not human, but people nonetheless. And like humans, all people had the potential to suck. A beautiful white haired being had, instead of introducing themselves, launched themself at Darcy with sharp needley teeth bared. Darce had tazed the fuck out of that fucker, then tazed them again, then again every time they moved. Eventually she’d given them to the tentacle creature in the purple-sky-and-stars-place, which was part of why they were such good friends now. Food and companionship man, they were powerful motivators.

But it has just proven to Darcy that space vampires were, evidently, a thing. 

So were orcs. Well. They probably didn’t call themselves orcs, Darcy thought. But they were a thing. Giant, blue. Yeah. Orcs. They lived in the just-as-dim-blue-place with the giant penguin shadows. They thankfully didn’t bother Darcy once they’d been tazed once or twice, and generally steered clear of her when she was passing through. She found it pretty funny actually; she was like - hobbit sized to them. Thor bless her tazer. 

(Well, he actually had, not officially or anything, but she’d totally researched the runes and inscribed them into her little protector with all sorts of intent. She might not think Jane’s ex-flame was actually - you know - _a god_ , but a little extra insurance never hurt anyone.)

The tall shadow - they didn’t so much follow as - travel similar paths. Sometimes Darcy would see them ahead of her, a tall lean shape, a dark silhouette against what light there might be in what passed for the sky. Other times they were behind, the shuffling step of dragging feet along the dim paths, never gaining on her, but never falling too far behind. It is likely they already know of the place-with-the-yellow-sky. It is likely they already know of Helen and Betty and Jane and their garden of improbable fruit with Jane’s instruments searching the stars for a home that has ceased to exist. But Darcy would not lead the tall shadow to them. 

In the purple-sky-and-stars-place, where she had a handy tentacle monster nearby for body disposal should she need it, Darcy double and triple checked her tazer, then cloaked herself, and became the shadow she hunted.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [will never find safety in numbers](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15887586) by [Yatzuaka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yatzuaka/pseuds/Yatzuaka)




End file.
